Report system and method using prompt objects

ABSTRACT

An report system that incorporates prompt objects in a report definition to enable a user to specify answers to questions to customize a reporting system (e.g., decision support system, business intelligence and OLAP) report at execution time. A prompt object contains a single question to be answered, validation values for the answer, and attributes indicating how the prompt object is to be processed. A report is thus defined by selecting prompt objects in place of templates, filters, or any of the aspects of a template or filter. As a separate object, a single prompt may be issued once and the answer supplied to each reference to the prompt object in a report.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to a system that enables creation of reportingsystem, decision support system, business intelligence and on-lineanalytical processing reports that use prompt objects to define anyaspect of the report, with the prompt objects being resolved at run-timeof the report.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Reporting system and decision support system have been developed toefficiently retrieve selected information from data warehouses. One typeof decision support system is known as an on-line analytical processingsystem (“OLAP”). In general, OLAP systems analyze the data from a numberof different perspectives and support complex analyses against largeinput data sets. OLAP systems generate output upon execution of a reportthat includes a template to indicate the way to present the output and afilter to specify the conditions of data on which the report is to beprocessed.

Reports may be extremely complicated and require many seconds, minutes,and sometimes even hours to process. Designing such complex reports islabor intensive. Further, in current systems, once a report is designed,if a user desires to change the template, filter, or any othersub-object or component, a completely new report must be created throughthe same laborious tasks. Although some report writing wizards have beendeveloped in this field, those wizards also must be programmed and oftenonly provide specific options from which a report designer may choose.Accordingly, the report writing wizards are often not useful to thereport designer that generates a complex report. The inflexibility ofcurrent report creation systems is a drawback of current OLAP. Otherdrawbacks with current systems exist as well.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the present invention provides prompt objects that may beused to define some or every aspect of a report. A prompt object inobject-oriented programming terms is a separate object from any reportin which it is contained. In one embodiment, a prompt object contains asingle question to be answered, validation values for the answer, andattributes indicating how the prompt object is to be processed. Inaddition, default values may be provided for the prompt object.

A report can thus be defined by selecting prompt objects in place ofportions of static report definition including, but not limited to,templates, filters, or any of the aspects of a template or filter.Report definition involves specification of the elements to generate anoutput. For example, if a template is defined by a prompt object, thenwhen a report is executed, the report prompts the user to select atemplate. The selected template is then validated based on the promptobject validation values and then processed.

By using prompts that are resolved at run-time, a complex report may becreated that enables a wide variety of variation, depending on userpreferences. A relatively untrained person may then execute the report,respond to the prompts and get a customized report. Additionally, inOLAP systems, a metadata database is often used to assist in accessingdata from the data warehouse. The metadata may include reportdefinitions, which limits the users who may create their own reports. Bydefining a report using prompts, users effectively create their ownreport based on the answers they provide to the prompts.

In addition, by creating each prompt as a separate prompt object, anumber of advantages are realized. A single prompt may be shared by manyother objects that are part of a report. That single prompt may then beasked of the user only once, resolved and then the answer may beprovided for each place in which the prompt object is referenced. Also,as a prompt object, the validation values may be stored in the promptobject so that each time a particular prompt is used, the validationvalues are used to ensure that the answer is valid. Answers given to aprompt object may be stored in association with the prompt object sothat in future executions of a report or execution of other reports thatreference the same prompt object, that answer may be provided as adefault value with or without prompting the user.

Further, by using prompt objects, other functions such as prompt inprompt and prompt object abstraction for report delivery may be providedas described in detail below.

Additionally, unlike report wizards where the programmer of the reportwizard hard-codes the available options to present to the user, bydefining a report using prompt objects, a report designer may create acustomized report wizard by selecting the prompt objects to include inthe report. The benefit is illustrated by an example. A report wizardhas a fixed number of questions and answers to be provided before itcreates a report. By using prompt objects, the report creator determinesthe number of questions. Instead of requiring the user to input fifteenanswers, therefore, the user may only be required to provide two. Also,the questions to be asked of the user may be changed by selectingdifferent prompt objects, rather than having to rewrite the wizard code.

Other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent to one ofordinary skill in the art upon reviewing the detailed description of theinvention.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates a network architecture according to an embodiment ofthe invention.

FIG. 2 illustrates a flowchart of query engine processing according toan embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3 depicts a flow diagram of the relationship between components ofa report instance according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 depicts a schematic diagram illustrating prompt object reportinitiation according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 depicts a schematic diagram illustrating prompt object reportresolution components according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 6 depicts a schematic diagram illustrating user prompt executionaccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 depicts a diagram illustrating the relationship between promptobject, prompt instance and resolution object properties according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 depicts a schematic diagram illustrating an example template withprompt objects included according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

FIG. 9 depicts a schematic diagram indicating use of a prompt objectused by a parent and child object according to an embodiment of thepresent invention.

FIG. 10 depicts output of a template using a prompt object according toan embodiment of the present invention.

FIGS. 11 a and 11 b depict output of metrics of a template according toan embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 12 depicts a table illustrating actions on draft prompts accordingto an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 13 depicts a diagram illustrating draft prompt resolution accordingto an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 14 depicts a table illustrating properties of various types ofprompts according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIGS. 15-17 illustrate objects used to manipulate prompts underdifferent uses of the prompts according to an embodiment of the presentinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides prompt objects for use in resolvingreports in a reporting system, decision support system, businessintelligence or OLAP system. An embodiment of an architecture forprocessing reports in which this invention may be used is provided inFIGS. 1 and 2 which are described below.

Throughout the specification, an embodiment of prompt objects used toprompt a user connected to a reporting system using a client-serverarchitecture is provided. It should be appreciated that the presentinvention is also applicable to a system in which a user connects to areporting system server through a web interface, telephone interface,report requesting system with reports automatically delivered to theuser or some other interface. MicroStrategy's Narrowcaster, Telecaster,and Web systems may be used, for example.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a system 100 by which a varietyof data resources may be accessed for business analytic, reportgeneration and other intelligence purposes according to an embodiment ofthe invention. According to a preferred embodiment, the system 100 maycomprise an Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) decision support system(DSS). In particular, FIG. 1 may comprise a portion of the MicroStrategy7 or 7.1 platform which provides a preferred system in which the presentinvention may be implemented.

In general, through using the system 100 of the invention, analysts,managers and other users may query or interrogate a plurality ofdatabases or database arrays to extract demographic, sales, and/orfinancial data and information and other patterns from records stored insuch databases or database arrays to identify strategic trends. Thosestrategic trends may not be discernable without processing the queriesand treating the results of the data extraction according to thetechniques performed by the systems and methods of the invention. Thisis in part because the size and complexity of some data portfoliosstored in such databases or database arrays may mask those trends.

In addition, system 100 may enable the creation of reports or servicesthat are processed according to a schedule. Users may then subscribe tothe service, provide personalization criteria and have the informationautomatically delivered to the user, as described in U.S. Pat. No.6,154,766 to Yost et al., which is commonly assigned and herebyincorporated by reference.

As illustrated in FIG. 1, a business, a government or another user mayaccess the resources of the system 100 using a user engine 102. The userengine 102 may include a query input module 116 to accept a plurality ofsearches, queries or other requests, via a query box on a graphical userinterface (GUI) or another similar interface. The user engine 102 maycommunicate with an analytical engine 104. The analytical engine 104 mayinclude a set of extensible modules to run a plurality of statisticalanalyses, to apply filtering criteria, to perform a neural net techniqueor another technique to condition and treat data extracted from dataresources hosted in the system 100, according to a query received fromthe user engine 102.

The analytical engine 104 may communicate with a query engine 106, whichin turn interfaces to one or more data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . .. 108 n (where n is an arbitrary number). The data storage devices 108a, 108 b . . . 108 n may include or interface to a relational databaseor another structured database stored on a hard disk, an optical disk, asolid state device or another similar storage media. When implemented asdatabases, the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may includeor interface to, for example, an Oracle™ relational database such assold commercially by Oracle Corporation, an Informix database, aDatabase 2 (DB2) database, a Sybase™ database, or another data storagedevice or query format, platform or resource such as an OLAP format, aStandard Query Language (SQL) format, a storage area network (SAN), or aMicrosoft Access™ database. It should be understood that while datastorage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n are illustrated as a pluralityof data storage devices, in some embodiments the data storage devicesmay be contained within a single database or another single resource.

Any of the user engine 102, the analytical engine 104 and the queryengine 106 or other resources of the system 100 may include or interfaceto or be supported by computing resources, such as one or moreassociated servers. When a server is employed for support, the servermay include, for instance, a workstation running a Microsoft Windows™NT™ operating system, a Windows™ 2000 operating system, a Unix operatingsystem, a Linux operating system, a Xenix operating system, an IBM AIX™operating system, a Hewlett-Packard UX™ operating system, a NovellNetware™ operating system, a Sun Microsystems Solaris™ operating system,an OS/2™ operating system, a BeOS™ operating system, a MacIntoshoperating system, an Apache platform, an OpenStep™ operating system, oranother similar operating system or platform. According to oneembodiment of the present invention, analytical engine 104 and queryengine 106 may comprise elements of an intelligence server 103.

The data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may be supported by aserver or another resource and may, in some embodiments, includeredundancy, such as a redundant array of independent disks (RAID), fordata protection. The storage capacity of any one or more of the datastorage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may be of various sizes, fromrelatively small data sets to very large database (VLDB)-scale datasets, such as warehouses holding terabytes of data or more. The fieldsand types of data stored within the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b .. . 108 n may also be diverse, and may include, for instance, financial,personal, news, marketing, technical, addressing, governmental,military, medical or other categories of data or information.

The query engine 106 may mediate one or more queries or informationrequests from those received from the user at the user engine 102 toparse, filter, format and otherwise process such queries to be submittedagainst the data contained in the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . .. 108 n. Thus, a user at the user engine 102 may submit a queryrequesting information in SQL format, or have the query translated toSQL format. The submitted query is then transmitted via the analyticalengine 104 to the query engine 106. The query engine 106 may determine,for instance, whether the transmitted query may be processed by one ormore resources of the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n inits original format. If so, the query engine 106 may directly transmitthe query to one or more of the resources of the data storage devices108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n for processing.

If the transmitted query cannot be processed in its original format, thequery engine 106 may perform a translation of the query from an originalsyntax to a syntax compatible with one or more of the data storagedevices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n by invoking a syntax module 118 toconform the syntax of the query to standard SQL, DB2, Informix™, Sybase™formats or to other data structures, syntax or logic. The query engine106 may likewise parse the transmitted query to determine whether itincludes any invalid formatting or to trap other errors included in thetransmitted query, such as a request for sales data for a future year orother similar types of errors. Upon detecting an invalid or anunsupported query, the query engine 106 may pass an error message backto the user engine 102 to await further user input.

When a valid query such as a search request is received and conformed toa proper format, the query engine 106 may pass the query to one or moreof the data storage devices 108 a, 108 n . . . 108 n for processing. Insome embodiments, the query may be processed for one or more hitsagainst one or more databases in the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b .. . 108 n. For example, a manager of a restaurant chain, a retail vendoror another similar user may submit a query to view gross sales made bythe restaurant chain or retail vendor in the State of New York for theyear 1999. The data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may besearched for one or more fields corresponding to the query to generate aset of results 114.

Although illustrated in connection with each data storage device 108 inFIG. 1, the results 114 may be generated from querying any one or moreof the databases of the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n,depending on which of the data resources produce hits from processingthe search query. In some embodiments of the system 100 of theinvention, the results 114 may be maintained on one or more of the datastorage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n to permit one or morerefinements, iterated queries, joinders or other operations to beperformed on the data included in the results 114 before passing theinformation included in the results 114 back to the analytical engine104 and other elements of the system 100.

When any such refinements or other operations are concluded, the results114 may be transmitted to the analytical engine 104 via the query engine106. The analytical engine 104 may then perform statistical, logical orother operations on the results 114 for presentation to the user. Forinstance, the user may submit a query asking which of its retail storesin the State of New York reached $1M in sales at the earliest time inthe year 1999. Or, the user may submit a query asking for an average, amean and a standard deviation of an account balance on a portfolio ofcredit or other accounts.

The analytical engine 104 may process such queries to generate aquantitative report 110, which may include a table or other outputindicating the results 114 extracted from the data storage devices 108a, 108 b . . . 108 n. The report 110 may be presented to the user viathe user engine 102, and, in some embodiments, may be temporarily orpermanently stored on the user engine 102, a client machine orelsewhere, or printed or otherwise output. In some embodiments of thesystem 100 of the invention, the report 110 or other output may betransmitted to a transmission facility 112, for transmission to a set ofpersonnel via an email, an instant message, a text-to-voice message, avideo or via another channel or medium. The transmission facility 112may include or interface to, for example, a personalized broadcastplatform or service such as the Narrowcaster™ platform or Telecaster™service sold by MicroStrategy Incorporated or another similarcommunications channel or medium. Similarly, in some embodiments of theinvention, more than one user engine 102 or other client resource maypermit multiple users to view the report 110, such as, for instance, viaa corporate intranet or over the Internet using a Web browser. Variousauthorization and access protocols may be employed for security purposesto vary the access permitted users to such report 110 in suchembodiments.

Additionally, as described in the '766 patent, an administrative leveluser may create a report as part of a service. Subscribers/users maythen receive access to reports through various types of data deliverydevices including telephones, pagers, PDAs, WAP protocol devices, email,facsimile, and many others. In addition, subscribers may specify triggerconditions so that the subscriber receives a report only when thatcondition has been satisfied, as described in detail in the '766 patent.The platform of FIG. 1 may have many other uses, as described in detailwith respect to the Micro Strategy 7 and 7.1 platform, the details ofwhich will be appreciated by one of ordinary skill in the reporting anddecision support system art.

The steps performed in a method 200 for processing data according to theinvention are illustrated in the flowchart of FIG. 2. In step 202, themethod 200 begins. In step 204, the user may supply input, such as aquery or a request for information, via the user engine 102. In step206, the user input query may be preliminarily processed, for instance,to determine whether it includes valid fields and for other formattingand error-flagging issues. In step 208, any error conditions may betrapped and an error message presented to the user, for correction ofthe error conditions. In step 210, if a query is in a valid format, thequery may then be transmitted to the analytical engine 104.

In step 212, the analytical engine 104 may further process the inputquery as appropriate to ensure the intended results 114 may be generatedto apply the desired analytics. In step 214, the query engine 106 mayfurther filter, format and otherwise process the input query to ensurethat the query is in a syntax compatible with the syntax of the datastorage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n. In step 216, one or moreappropriate databases or other resources within the data storage devices108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may be identified to be accessed for the givenquery.

In step 218, the query may be transmitted to the data storage devices108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n and the query may be processed for hits orother results 114 against the content of the data storage devices 108 a,108 b . . . 108 n. In step 220, the results 114 of the query may berefined, and intermediate or other corresponding results 114 may bestored in the data storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n. In step222, the final results 114 of the processing of the query against thedata storage devices 108 a, 108 b . . . 108 n may be transmitted to theanalytical engine 104 via the query engine 106. In step 224, a pluralityof analytical measures, filters, thresholds, statistical or othertreatments may be run on the results 114. In step 226, a report 110 maybe generated. The report 110, or other output of the analytic or otherprocessing steps, may be presented to the user via the user engine 102.In step 228, the method 200 ends.

As discussed above, the present invention provides the ability to useprompt objects to define a report. The following section describes theterminology used in understanding how reports are resolved with promptobjects.

A prompt object is a part of a report's definition that is bound atreport execution time, instead of report construction time. When thereport is executed, a user supplies an answer to complete the promptobject.

A report is defined by defining the objects that make up the report.According to one embodiment of the present invention, part or all of thedefinition of an object in a report may be replaced with a promptobject. When the report is executed, the user is prompted to provide themissing parts of the prompts found in the report's objects. Prompts haveseveral uses, including the following. Prompts enable untrained peopleto “specify” a report instance. A power user constructs a report usingprompt objects. An untrained person is able to select and execute thereport. They then answer a series of prompted questions to determine theexact parameters used to execute this report instance. An untrained userdoes not need to know how to use either any object editors, or even theany object wizards, but instead answers questions posed in their ownframe of reference. A large installation may have many users of the datawarehouse who have no authority to modify the metadata in any way.Prompts give such users the ability to ‘modify’ a report withoutchanging the metadata. An experienced user may use prompts as a way ofexecuting several similar reports. The user executes the same reportseveral times, giving different values for the prompt on each occasion.

The basic functionality of prompts is to “ask a question and get ananswer.” Additionally, prompts may provide the following additionalfeatures. Prompts can be shared between several objects. When severalobjects in a report use the same prompt, the question may be asked onlyonce. Each prompt may have a default value. This value can be used whenthe report is executed offline (e.g., through the use of the scheduler).This value is also useful to the GUI when presenting a prompt to theuser. Depending on the type of question that a prompt object asks, acreator of a prompt object may express restrictions on the set of valuesthat are acceptable as answers of the question. The system may thusvalidate the answer to a prompt. Answers given to any or all of theprompts in a report may be saved. When a report definition is given tothe report server to be executed, the saved answers may be used insteadof questioning the user. When the report server asks the GUI to resolvea prompt, the report server makes the saved answer available forpossible use by the GUI. The answers saved from one report can beapplied to the execution of a different report. It is possible tospecify that a saved answer to a specific prompt should be used withoutprompting the user to answer the prompt again. In this case no call backmay be made to the GUI to answer these prompts.

According to the present invention, a prompt is provided as a promptobject. As such, the following benefits are realized. The flow ofcontrol algorithm regularly calls for prompts to be passed from oneplace to another. The DSS Object is the level of granularity at whichthat information is transferred. If a large filter contains a single,small prompt, the entire filter does not have to be sent to the clientto answer the prompt. Also, prompts may be shared much more easily.Implementing prompts as separate objects enables prompts to be sharedbecause it may simply be referenced to as an object. If prompts werepart of the object that contains the prompt then it would be very hardto support sharing since one DSS Object would have to point to part ofanother object. It would be difficult to decide which of the two objectsthat share the prompt actually contains the prompt.

Prompts as separate objects make it much easier to write a light clientapplication that executes reports. The client application responds toprompts but does not need to incorporate knowledge of the interfacesused to describe application objects.

There are a number of objects involved in prompt resolution as discussedbelow. An application object is an object created by an “Agent-level”interface. Application objects are used to define reports. The principalapplication objects are report definitions, filters, templates andmetrics. Each application object can be viewed as a collection ofproperties. These properties are grouped together into interfaces. Anobject is defined by specifying a value for each property.

Application objects contain prompt objects that then replace parts ofthe application object's definition. The application object recordsinformation about how the prompts that it contains should be resolvedand in particular how they should be related to prompts in otherapplication objects.

Prompt objects (questions)—A prompt object is an entity that can beassociated with an application object as well as properties in theapplication object. An application object may have multiple prompts,each replacing different properties of the object, and the same promptobject may be used several times but there cannot be more than oneprompt for the same property.

A prompt object includes a question. The designer of the prompt objectsupplies a question for the server system to ask to fill in the gap inthe object's definition. Many different types of prompts may beprovided. The type of prompt object corresponds to the type of data thatconstitutes a valid answer to the prompt question (e.g., a number, astring, a filter object, multiple filter-objects, a template unit etc.).A prompt may also contain information used to validate an answer, and abusiness explanation of what the question means. It may contain adefault answer to use if the user declines to answer the question.

Resolution objects (answers)—The process of resolving prompts is theprocess of binding an answer to each prompt question in the reportinstance. A resolution object may comprise a collection of answers.

While a report instance is being executed, a collection of answers isbuilt up in the resolution object. In addition, a resolution object maybe used to hold the list of unresolved prompts and to provide a contextfor resolving the report instance. There is preferably a one to onerelationship between prompts that appear in the resolution object, andquestions that are asked to the user. This becomes an issue when aprompt is used several times in the same report instance. The definitionof the report specifies which of these instances of the prompt are to bemerged into a single question. The resolution object will preferablyhold one instance of the prompt for each time that the question is to beasked, not for each time that the prompt appears in the report instance.

A resolution object is preferably a persistent object. A user may save aresolution object to metadata. When a report executes, a savedresolution object may be used to answer some of the prompts in thereport instance. Another use of a saved resolution object is that it canbe used to modify the ‘default’ answers to the prompts in a report.

Report instance—A report instance object represents a particularexecution of a report. It contains the exact report definition, filterand template used for the report. It may contain an application-objectstable that contains the exact version of other application objects usedfor this report execution. A report instance preferably contains asingle resolution object. The resolution object contains the answersgiven for the prompts when this report instance was executed. The reportinstance object contains numerous other properties that are built up asthe report is executed. Most notably this includes SQL and the resultset.

One other useful property of the report instance is “Job.” This returnsthe job object (if known) used to execute this report instance.Internally, a JobID is stored in a report instance to match reportinstances with jobs during report execution.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of an object map of a report instance. Areport instance 302 is a specific execution of a particular report. Areport instance has a job ID as described above. In addition, eachreport instance 302 is associated with a report definition 304, atemplate 306, a filter 308, a resolution object 310, various otherapplication objects 312, and various object information sources 314.

Prompts are executed as part of a report but entail additional stepsfrom the ordinary report execution. Control flow for prompt executiongenerally involves execution start, acknowledgement, resolution, andprompting the user to complete resolution. FIG. 4 shows an illustrationof how execution starts in a three-tier environment. A two-tierarchitecture may also be used with a report execution in place of anintelligence server and without report net objects. To execute a report,the system determines a report definition 304 or a filter 308 andtemplate 306.

In one example, execution begins when the client calls methods on areport server 404 to create and execute a client-side report instance302. There are several ways that this can be done. The client may supplya report definition 304, which includes a filter 308 and template 306,or may supply the filter 308 and template 306 separately. A resolutionobject 310 may also be created or, the client has an option to copy anexisting resolution object 310 into the report instance. This allows theclient to provide answers to some prompt questions before they areasked. According to an embodiment of the present invention, it should beappreciated that resolution objects may be created for users by thirdparty systems or as part of the system of the present invention andstored. When a report is to be executed, then a resolution object may bespecified for the report to use in execution so that the user does nothave to answer prompts at run-time. The answers may be generated andstored in an resolution object and used to process the report.

For example, if a report is scheduled as a part of a subscriptionservice as described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,154,766, commonlyassigned to MicroStrategy, resolutions objects may be created forsubscribers to the report, associated with the report and then processedwith the report when the service is scheduled to result in personalizedreports based on the answers to prompts provided in the report. As partof that process, the prompts may be generated and provided to the userbeforehand and stored.

Preferably, a client-side report instance 302 is then created, but ifthe object definitions are not already loaded on the client, populationof the client side report instance may be delayed. Next, a report server404 calls a report net client 406 to transfer the execution request toan intelligence server 408. Report net client 406 comprises a systemthat constructs and receives report execution messages on the clientside preferably. Server 408 then uses a report net server 410 to decodethe message. A report net server 410 may comprise a system thatconstructs and receives report execution messages on the server side.Report server 412 determines if the cache was hit. Assuming there was nocache hit, the report server 412 creates a server-side report instance414 for this report. Control is returned to the Intelligence server 408.Through this process, a client side report instance 414 is created forexecution.

Next, report instance 414 may be optionally acknowledged as illustratedin FIG. 5. Server 408 creates a job to execute the report. The JobID isprovided to the client-side report instance so that the user can inquireabout the job's progress. Intelligence server 408 sends a standardmessage back to the client, and report net client 406 interprets themessage as a job acknowledgement. It writes the JobID into theclient-side report instance. From time to time server 408 may sendprogress report messages, and other messages to the client. The clienthandles them in a similar way to acknowledgement messages. Thedifference is that the client may raise an event with the user when itreceives a progress report message.

Next, after acknowledgment, resolution occurs. First, the report isresolved by loading the application objects 312 into report instance 414and discovering prompt objects contained therein. Intelligence server408 passes report instance 414 to resolution server 502. The resolutionserver performs the resolution action on a report instance. This actioninvolves several logically distinct, but physically intertwined actions,including loading a version of each application object into the bindingtable, identifying the prompt questions to be answered, storing thatinformation in the resolution object, incorporating the user's answersto prompts by extending the binding table, and identifying new prompts.The resolution server uses an object server 504 to get current versionsof the objects in report instance 414.

Object server 504 supplies DSS objects used during execution and acts asthe gatekeeper to a metadata server 506. It stores references to theseobjects in the report instance's AppObjects table 312. Object server 504uses metadata server 506 to load in missing objects from metadatarepository 508 (if there are any). If resolution server 502 was startedwith its ‘CacheOnly’ flag set, and it is tasked to load in additionalobjects, then resolution server 502 abandons report execution at thispoint and passes control back to Intelligence server 408. Resolutionserver 502 obtains the complete list of prompts in report instance 414.It stores a list of prompts in resolution object 310. It detects whetheror not report instance 414 has any outstanding prompts. If there areprompts, but each one of them is answered, then resolution server 502asks report server 412 to check its cache 510. It is possible that acache hit occurs here that was not available earlier. In either case,control is passed back to Intelligence server 408.

At this point, the user is prompted. The prompting process isillustrated with respect to FIG. 6. Intelligence server 408 examinesreport instance 302 to determine what to do with it next. If it findsthat execution is completed (or an error occurred) then it returnsreport instance 302 to the client. Likewise, report instance 302 maytell server 408 to pass it to another server.

If there are unresolved prompts, report instance 414 asks server 408 topass it back to the client. Intelligence server 408 passes reportinstance 414 back to report net server 502 which prepares a messagecontaining the information the client is likely to use to answer theprompt. Intelligence server 408 may then put its job into a sleep state,but may maintain the server-side report instance. Report net client 410adds information to the client-side report instance 302, (and it may addobjects to the client-side object server). It raises an event on reportserver 412. Which raises an outstanding-prompts event with the user. Theuser resolves the outstanding prompts in resolution object 310. The userreturns from the event when this is done. Report net client 410 createsa return message. Changes in resolution object 310 are sent back. Reportnet server 502 amends the server-side report instance 414. It relies onIntelligence server 408 to pass it the existing report instance. Again,as another embodiment, a user may be prompted from an intelligenceserver 408 through a web server through web dialoging systems such asone offered by MicroStrategy web.

In some events, the user's answers to the first prompts may causefurther prompts to be triggered, or more application objects to beloaded. So Intelligence server 408 follows up on a client's prompts bypassing the report instance back to resolution server 502. This processcontinues until all prompts are resolved.

An embodiment of prompting from the user's perspective is now described.First, the user obtains a session. From the session the user has anIDSSSource interface (OS) to the object server, and an IDSSReportSourceinterface (RS) to the report server. The first interface is used toobtain objects and the second interface is used to execute reports.

The user then creates a report instance that is to be executed byfinding or creating either a report definition object, or a filter andtemplate object. The user does this with object server 504. Then theuser does one of the following actions. First, the user may call amethod on one of the DSS objects to create a report instance and startexecuting it synchronously. Second, the user creates a report instance.The user then calls an execute command on this instance. The advantageof this manner of executing reports is that it allows the user toexecute reports containing objects that have not been saved to metadata.The user may also edit the objects in the report instance beforeexecution starts. Or third, the user may create and execute a reportinstance. These methods are used to execute objects that already existin the metadata. In this process, the user may avoid the step of loadingthe definition of report objects to the client machine.

As resolution server 502 finds prompts in the report instance, itaccumulates them in resolution object 310 of report instance 414.Execution continues for as long as possible, but eventually the systemobtains an answer for each prompt.

The resolution server examines a report execution flag recorded in thereport instance. If this flag is set, then the prompts are answered in adefault manner without prompting the user. Either execution cancontinue, or some prompt in the report has a default setting thatrequires user input to continue. In the latter case the report executionfails.

Otherwise the resolution server seeks help from the user to continue.Control is passed back to report server 412, which sends an event to theuser to resolve the prompts. There may be three responses to the prompt.These are to abort execution, continue execution (after answering someprompts), and the default action, which means that each prompt isanswered in whatever default manner was defined when the prompt wasincluded in the report.

Resolution server 502 populates report instance 414 with properties thatit generated from the definition and prompts. The following threeproperties may be used: ResolvedDefiniton—the DSS ReportDefinitionobject for this report instance; ResolvedFilter—the DSS filter objectfor this report instance; and ResolvedTemplate—the DSS Template objectfor this report instance. In each case the property contains an objectbased on the original object (Definition, Filter, Template) but withsubstitutions made for the prompts. If there were no prompts then theseproperties are left to the original object. Objects other than these mayhave been substituted. The version of the object from the binding tableis preferably used rather than the object from the object server.Subsequent stages of report execution use the resolved objects, not theoriginal objects. In particular the final grid is based on theResolvedTemplate, not on the original template.

After execution has completed, a user can modify the report instance,and then ask to execute it again. Unless the user provides a specialsetting (e.g., do cross-tabulation only) the report instance determineswhat changes are to be performed. Changes to the resolved objects causethe cross-tabulation (e.g., layout changes only) or SQL generation (e.g,contents changes) actions to be performed again. Changing the resolutionobject, or the original report definition, filter or template cause theresolution stage (and hence engine, etc.) to be performed again.Changing the definition of one of the other objects is not detected.

Prompt resolution occurs according to a default order set by the system.If a report creator desires to provide a different order, then thefollowing additional feature may be utilized. A report may be provided acollection of prompt instances that, when populated, specify the orderof resolution of the prompt objects in the report to override thedefault order.

While the basic operation of prompt objects and the resolution processhas been described, it should be appreciated that numerous modificationsand advanced uses are also provided, as described below.

It may be desired to enable this order of prompts being resolved to beset by a user. For example, in general, each application object maycontain a collection of one or more prompt objects. The same prompt mayappear multiple times in an application object. An application objectrecords information about how its prompts should be resolved. Thisinformation includes the order of resolution, explanation messages forthe user and whether the prompt is asked as separate questions or mergedwith other instances of the same prompt. The resolution object containsa prompt instance for each separate question that might be asked to theuser. This collection can be accessed in two ways: in resolution order(this presents the prompts in the order in which they should beresolved, with each prompt instance indicating from which object (orobjects) it comes) or based upon an object and prompt identifier (thispattern of access is needed to determine the answer recorded for aspecific prompt object).

By default, prompts in objects are resolved without reference to therelationships between the objects. However when one application object(the parent or container object), contains a reference to anotherapplication object (the child or dependent object) the parent object mayoverride the prompts in the child object through an import/exportmechanism described below. The parent object may elect to export one ormore of its prompts. The child object may elect to import one or more ofits prompts. If the child object is used in an object that exports acorresponding prompt then the resolution server will use the prompt fromthe parent object instead of the prompt in the child object. The childobject's prompt is not passed to the user for execution. An applicationobject might specify that a prompt should automatically be closed assoon as it is detected in a prompt.

One aspect of the present invention relates to making each prompt aseparate DSS object. In addition to the properties of a prompt objectdescribed above a prompt object is also defined by principle propertiesof the prompt interface including the following described in thisparagraph. Type: Indicated the type of data expected to answer to theprompt; Validation properties: Each type of prompt may have propertiesthat restrict acceptable answers for this prompt (These properties areused to validate any answer that might be given and the nature of theseproperties depends on the nature of the question asked by the prompt);Prompt properties: Each validation property may be replaced by a prompt(This allows a user to define a prompt whose valid answers depend on aprevious prompt); Exports properties: As with all types of objects thatrefer to objects that might contain prompts, prompt objects containexport collections to contain the prompts exported to the dependentobjects; Default: Each type specific interface may have a ‘Default’property (This property holds the default answer given to this prompt,if any is known, which can be overridden when a prompt is used in aparticular object—The default value may not directly contain prompts,but it may contain objects that contain prompts) Title: A string used tointroduce the question; Meaning: An extended explanation (i.e., astring) about what the question means (for example, this might besomething like “The summary report will exclude all divisions whosetotal revenue was less than this amount.”); Reuse: A prompt recordsinformation on how the systems responds when presented with an instanceof the prompt from a previous report execution (whether prompt the useragain or use the prompt's previous value or default value as the defaultanswer); Properties: The prompt has a DSSProperties interface; Merge:This Boolean property indicates whether different instances of the sameprompt are merged into a single instance; Index: The index number of aprompt instance in its application object (for multiple use of the sameprompt object); Importable: True if the prompt instance may be replacedby a prompt imported from the prompt's container; ImportAs: Used if thesystem is to import a prompt instance as a different prompt object;ExportsToPrompt: Collection of exports the prompt's container into theprompt (each export describes another prompt instance in the sameapplication object that corresponds to a prompt inside this promptinstance); Answer: This property returns the value chosen by the user toanswer this prompt (or the value used if the user declines to answer theprompt); Locations: The places where the prompt is found; Closed: Trueif the prompt has been answered; Used: True for a prompt that is used inthe report instance (allows a user to distinguish between prompts thatare really used and prompts whose sole purpose is to store a previousanswer); the latter prompts are useful if a user expects the prompt tocome up later in the resolution process); Incomplete: True for a promptthat cannot be answered because its validation properties depend onanother prompt; Locked: True for a prompt which has already beenanswered, but whose answer cannot be changed (a prompt may be locked ifthe prompt's answer was used to build another prompt's validationproperties); Previous: This property is only available at reportexecution time. If the user provided a previous resolution object, itcontains the Answer for this prompt in the previous resolution object;and HasPrevious: True if a prompt has a previous value.

A prompt object can be used in one or more of the following ways. Thesimplest way is as a DSS object. This is an object stored in themetadata. The second way is as a prompt instance embedded in anotherobject. This is generally like the metadata object, but the other objectmay override some of the properties. The third way is as a resolved (orto be resolved) prompt in a resolution object. In this case theresolution object fills in additional properties about the specificusage of the prompt. FIG. 7 indicates what properties relate to theresolution object, prompt instance and prompt object.

Greater details of how some of these properties may be applied areprovided. One such property is the reuse property. To use a promptobject, one is obtained from either a new creation or an existing promptobject. The default behavior is to merge all instances of the sameprompt object, so a user should reuse an existing prompt object if theuser wants to ask the question that it represents only once.

If a user does not want to reuse the prompt object, then the object maybe embedded in whatever application object is going to use the prompt.Externally the prompt object appears to be part of the applicationobject. However only its container, or another object in the container,can use an embedded object.

The reuse property indicates how the system operates when a prompt isreused, or when to mark a prompt as closed. This value is stored as partof the prompt object. It can be overridden in a prompt instance that isnot merged with other instances of the same prompt. In other words aprompt instance that has the merge property set to ‘False’ can assignits own value to the reuse property.

The reuse property may be used as follows. When a new prompt isdetected, an entry is created in the resolution object to hold theanswer for the prompt. This prompt question has a Boolean property,closed, that is used to indicate whether or not the user has answeredthe question. Normally this property is set to “False” to indicate thatthe user has not answered the question. However the setting of the reuseglobal property can be used to “auto-close” the prompt. The question ismarked as already answered as soon as it is detected. This implements a“do not ask me this question again” feature. The reuse propertyindicates the circumstances under which the prompt is closedautomatically, and to which value it is closed. The reuse property isalso used to determine what to do if the user declines to answer aprompt.

FIG. 8 illustrates an overview of the properties and objects associatedwith using a prompt instance. In this example, the application thatcontains prompt instances is shown as a template 802. It should beappreciated that filters are also application objects and the example ofFIG. 8 may be applied to filters as well. Templates 802 contain variousinformation blocks 804 including application object 806 which contains acollection of all of the prompt instances that appear somewhere in thisparticular template. Thus, application object 806 references all of theprompt instances 808 with each prompt instance relating to a singleprompt object. Further, the prompt instance may contain an import as 810reference which records how the prompt can be imported from the reportdefinition that exists outside of the template. The template 802 alsocomprises a plurality of metrics 812 as shown. For each metric thatappears in a template, there is a template metric object 814 whichcomprises a metric element 816 if the metric is explicitly known. If,however, the metric is to be defined by a prompt, then the promptinstance 818 is included within the template metric object 814. Ifprompts are exported from the template into the metric property, thenthere is export box 820 which includes exports 822 with each of theplurality of prompt instances 824. Below, prompt instances may be usedin the various ways. First, a prompt instance may be inserted intoanother object. Thus, a prompt instance may replace properties inanother object. If a user wants to use a prompt instead of the normalproperty they assign the prompt to the prompt-valued property. Followingthis assignment the application object creates a prompt instance basedon the given prompt object. The way to obtain the prompt instance is toread back the value of the prompt-valued property. The prompt instanceappears to be the same as the prompt, but may not be the same object.

A user can override the title and meaning properties of a promptinstance without affecting the prompt object. This ability allows thesame prompt object to be used multiple times in an application object.

The application object maintains a collection of the prompts that arebeing used in the application object. Whenever a user adds a new promptobject to the application object, the collection is extended to containthe new prompt object. The collection returns the prompt instance, notthe prompt object.

If the user inserts a prompt object into the application object that itis already using it, the default behavior is to give the user theexisting prompt instance. This means that by default if a user puts thesame prompt object in an application object in several places, thequestion is asked only once. If a user wants to have several instancesof the same prompt object in an application object, then the userdirectly inserts a second instance of the prompt into the collection.Then the user assigns the prompt-valued property with whichever instance(drawn from the collection) the user wants to use.

The prompt-instance collection cleanly handles multiple use of promptobjects within a single application object. It indicates which order theprompts should be presented to the user, and whether or not the sameprompt should be asked twice. The default is merger, but the mergeproperty allows the boolean input on that point. This property is storedat the prompt instance level. The resolution server merges togetherprompt instances (of the same prompt object) that it finds that havemerge set to ‘true.’ They are presented to the user as a single promptto resolve. If this property is set to ‘false,’ for a particular promptinstance, then the resolution server does not merge that particularprompt instance in with other prompt instances (of the same promptobject) found on other application objects. If merge is set to false,the user is only prompted once for each distinct application object thatcontains a prompt instance, even if the application object appearsseveral times in a report. If a designer wants to use an applicationobject twice in a report, and prompt the user twice, once for eachusage, then the designer uses the prompt import/export mechanismdescribed below. To avoid contradiction, in one embodiment, two distinctinstances of the same prompt object in the same application object toare not permitted to both have merge equal to true. Other properties ofthe prompt object may be modified at the level of the prompt instancesuch as default, reuse, importable, import as, and exports to prompt.

There may be situations in which a user wants to have finer control overhow prompt objects are resolved. For example, the user might want tospecify that a prompt on a child object is resolved before a prompt on aparent object, or that there is a more complex merging structure thanthe one shared instance, and multiple singleton instances structureprovided by the Merge property. An object can import prompts fromanother object that uses this object as one of its dependents. An objectcan export prompts into its dependent objects. The effect of thisoperation is to merge prompt instances between the parent and the child.The user is prompted with the prompt instance from the parent. Theanswer to this instance is used as the answer of both the parent and thechild prompt instance. The import/export mechanism provides us with away to explicitly merge prompt instances between a parent and a childobject. By being selective about which prompt instances in the parentare merged with which instances in the child, a user can impose acomplex merging structure. Since prompts are resolved from parentsbefore children a user can impose a different ordering on prompts fromchildren by importing them all to the parent. The order in which theprompts are resolved in the parent then takes priority.

When a prompt instance is exported from a parent object to a childobject, the prompt in the child is replaced with the prompt from theparent. In particular the properties of the child prompt instance areignored on the grounds that the user is not prompted with the childprompt instance. For example, the user may be prompted with the titleand meaning of the parent prompt instance, not of the child promptinstance.

FIG. 9 illustrates this situation. The designer specifies a report withtwo objects: object 902 and object 906, each object with its own promptinstance—prompt instance 904 and prompt instance 908, respectively. Thedesigner also specifies that the parent object 902 exports its instance904 and the child object 906 imports its instance 908. The resolutionserver determines that the imports and exports match as prompt 910. Itthen discards the prompt instance 908 of the child object, and insteadapplies the prompt instance 904 of the parent object to both the parentand the child.

Each application object contains a collection of prompt instances. Eachprompt instance on the application object has a boolean property calledimportable. This property defaults to ‘False.’ If the designer sets thisproperty to ‘True’ for some prompt instance then the resolution serverconsiders importing another prompt instance into the application objectto replace the prompt instance. The importable property indicates thatthe prompt instance might be replaced by a prompt instance imported froma parent application object.

An application object may also export prompt instances from itscollection of prompt instances into one of its dependent applicationobjects using a collection called exports. Each dependent object (whichcould contain prompts) may have its own collection. If the same childobject appears as a dependent in two different places inside the parentobject then there are two collections, one for each instance of thechild object. A designer may export different prompts into each instanceof the child object. The exports collection for a child object alwaysappears in the same interface as the child object. The collectionrecords information about which prompt instances from this object areexported into the child object. As with the importable property,exporting a prompt instance into a dependent object merely indicates awillingness to export the prompt, not a requirement to export theprompt. The prompt is only exported if the dependent object also importsit.

With regard to the import/export functionality, the resolution servermatches the imports into a child object with the exports from itsparent. When it finds a match it uses the prompt in the parent objectinstead of the prompt in the child object.

Imports and exports may be matched together in many ways, including aprocess of comparing the ObjectID of the imported and exported promptinstances. In other words they match if they are both instances of thesame prompt object. The advantage of this approach is that it allows adesigner to add or remove prompt instances (based on other promptobjects) from either the parent or the child object without breaking theimport/export relationship.

If a designer wants to match together two instances that are based ondifferent prompt objects, both the importer and the exporter are able to‘rename’ the prompt object. The designer may specify any prompt objectthat the resolution server should use in place of the prompt instancewhen matching imports and exports. If the designer wants to import twodifferent prompt instances based on the same prompt object, the designermay assign an ExportIndex number to each export.

For the first case prompt-object properties called ImportAs and ExportAsare used to ‘rename’ a prompt instance. These properties default to theprompt object that underlies the prompt instance. When the designerindicates that a prompt instance could be imported by setting Importableto ‘True’ she may also set the ImportAs property of the prompt instance.This property's value is a prompt object (not a prompt instance). Byspecifying a different prompt object, the designer can make theapplication object represent the prompt instance as a different promptfor import purposes. The designer can set this property to any promptobject that has the same prompt type as the prompt instance.

Multiple exports keyed to the same prompt object are resolved by usingan index number. The resolution server identifies each import and exportby assigning a key that contains a prompt object and a number to theimport or export.

Another aspect of the invention relates to the ability to provideprompts in prompts. A prompt may also contain a prompt collection andprompt instances of its own. Prompts may be used as part of thevalidation parameters of another prompt. Also, a prompt may be definedas a structure of ordinary objects with prompts embedded inside thestructure—called a draft prompt. For example a prompt can be defined asan expression containing other prompts.

The prompts that a prompt contains are part of the prompt object. In oneembodiment, they cannot be modified when a prompt object is used in aprompt instance. A prompt object can also import and export promptinstances in the usual manner. Within the definition of a prompt object,prompt instances from the prompt object's instance collection may beexported to other application objects that are dependents of the prompt.

An example of this is a prompt object that asks a user to “choose acity” with a validation property saying that it is valid only if thecity is located in a “choose a state” prompt object. That could beextended again to say that the answer to the “choose a state” promptobject imposes validation to a “choose a region” prompt object, etc.That prompt-in-prompt situation is resolved in reverse order by firstasking for region, then state, then city. A nested relationship ofprompts is thus possible.

In addition, there may be circumstances where the report designerdesires for multiple answers to be provided for each occurrence of aprompt object in a report rather than, by default merging the two promptobjects into one.

To suppress the default property, a user may set the merge property tofalse. If Merge is set to ‘False’ then each prompt instance (i.e.,specific usage of a prompt in a specific object) is prompted separately.The answer is still asked once and the answer applied to the variousinstances of the prompt object in the report. However even if someapplication object appears twice in the report, the prompts in theobject may only be asked once, and the answer may then be used everytime the application object is found in the report.

To enable an prompt object to be asked separately, the import/exportfacility according to the present invention may be employed.Specifically, the prompt object may be imported into the prompt instanceat run-time. Thus, each time the application object is used in thereport, the prompt instance of the prompt object is exported into thatapplication object. The system then treats each prompt instance as aseparate question (and assuming that Merge is ‘False’ on theseinstances) so they are not merged together.

The following example shows how this can be done. Suppose that the Yearprompt is defined as before, to prompt for a single integer value. Letus define the metric “SimpleInterest2” to prompt twice for a Year. Thefirst time it prompts for the stop year, the second time for the startyear. For simplicity of this example we will fix the rate to 5% simpleinterest per year.

A template “T2” is defined with SimpleInterest2 placed in its metricscollection twice. If the report were executed as is, then the report'sresult would show the metric twice. By turning off the mergefunctionality, execution prompts for Year twice—once for YearStart andonce for YearStop. The system prompts only once for YearStart and oncefor YearStop, even though the metric that contains these instancesappears twice in the template.

If there was a desire to prompt separately for the stop year for eachmetric, but only prompt once for the start year for both metrics, thatmay be achieved by exporting the stop year to both metrics, fromdifferent prompt instances in T2. This export distinguishes between thetwo instances, because they are different instances in T2. They are thenprompted separately.

The settings of the prompt instances in T2 are used, rather than thesettings of the single YearStop prompt instance on SimpleInterest2. Thisallows the designer to give them separate Meaning and Title strings.FIGS. 10 and 11 a-b illustrate the picture when a report containing thistemplate is resolved. The prompt Year is resolved to three promptquestions in the resolution object, distinguished from each other asshown in the diagram.

Another feature of the present invention involves resolution ordering ofprompt questions. The resolution server determines which order topresent the prompt questions to the user. A list of prompt instances isdetermined from the prompt instance collections of all of the objectsthat appear in the report instance. The exports, importable and mergeparameters specify exactly which of these instances are be mergedtogether to make a single prompt question.

One method for determining the order in which to present merged objectsis as follows. The non-prompt application objects are ordered in thereport instance in a topological order. This means that every objectappears before its dependents. In particular, the report definition isthe first object. Each object preferably only appears once in the list.This list is then expanded by replacing each object with the list ofprompt instances that it contains. The list of prompt instances that arecontained in the prompt instance is inserted before each promptinstance. That step is repeated recursively until every prompt instanceappears at least once. Each merged instance only appears once bystriking out duplicates—the first place it occurs.

The resolution object is a collection of prompts. It contains promptquestions. Each prompt question represents a single question that mightbe given to the user. A prompt question is obtained by merging togetherprompt instances from the report. One of the objectives of theresolution stage of report execution is to provide an answer to eachprompt that occurs in the report instance. The resolution objectcollects together the prompts that appear in the report instance. Thereare several ways in which an answer can be bound to a prompt includingthe following. The answer was known in advance. This happens if a reportinstance is executed using an old resolution object and a suitableanswer already exists in the collection. Also, the prompt may have beenspecified to be closed, even if there was no previous answer. Again,setting the reuse property does this. The designer can override thedefault value on a prompt instance to make the instance default to aparticular value. A designer might do this if she wants to reuse anexisting application object, but also wants to fix the value of one ofthe prompts in the object.

Also, the user of the resolution object supplies an explicit answer to aprompt; such as through a GUI response, a spreadsheet read or a datarepository access.

An answer may be provided in the following ways, for example. The usercan close the prompt to the previous value of the prompt (if any isknown), the client can close the prompt to its default value, or theclient can cancel the prompt. Canceling the prompt means that the clientexplicitly states that the prompt should not have an answer. Itcorresponds to the ‘empty’ value of a variant data type. Fourth, theclient of the resolution object may explicitly refuse to answer thequestion. We say that our client has declined to answer. The resolutionobject's response depends on the reuse setting made when the promptobject or prompt instance was defined. The default setting of reusestates that the resolution object should close a prompt to its defaultvalue if the client declines to answer it.

To prompt the user through a GUI, a client-side GUI wants to present theprompts in order. So we allow the client to access the resolutioncollection by index number. This access method shows all of the promptsin the resolution, whether or not an answer already exists for them, andwhether or not they are actually used.

If the client uses a wizard-like dialog to present these prompts to theuser, the user may be permitted to answer them in any order.

Sometimes a prompt (the ‘outer’ prompt) cannot be answered because theprompt is dependent on another prompt (the ‘inner’ prompt). To be moreprecise this happens when the outer prompt uses the inner prompt todefine its validation properties. An answer to the outer prompt cannotbe validated until after the user has assigned an answer to the innerprompt. The outer prompt is considered incomplete.

A read-only Boolean property called Incomplete may be used that isnormally ‘False.’ However for an incomplete prompt question it returns‘True.’ An incomplete prompt may not be closed until after all its innerprompt(s) have been closed. The resolution server is used to change aprompt's status from incomplete to complete. The resolution server hasthe power to perform substitutions of answers into prompts. The conceptof incomplete prompts is why the resolution object may override thevalidation properties of a prompt question. By using import/export it ispossible to design a report instance in which the same prompt isresolved multiple times with different values substituted in for itsinner prompts. A resolution object usually presents inner prompts beforeouter prompts in its collection. (An exception may be if the innerprompts appear in a draft prompt). If a user examines the promptquestions in order, and closes each one and then runs the resolutionserver again before going on to the next prompt, then the user does notencounter an incomplete prompt.

Various methods on the resolution object can be used to modify whichprompts appear in the resolution object. A client can call these methodsif a client wants to add or remove prompts directly from a resolutionobject.

Clients can use these methods to edit resolution objects that theyintend to save to metadata. However, a client preferably avoids editinga resolution object during report execution, since the resolution servermay not be able to detect the changes, and it may become confused.

Since the resolution object is a collection of prompts, the usualmethods to edit the collection are provided. In particular, there areclear and remove functions to take prompts out of the collection, and anadd function to put prompts into the collection.

Clear works in the usual way—it removes all of the prompts from aresolution. Remove is used to remove a specific member from thecollection. The member can be referred to by index number, by passing ina reference to the prompt question that is to be removed, or by usingany Item parameter that can be unambiguously matched to a particularprompt question.

The add method can be used to add a new prompt question. The argument toadd can either be a prompt object (in which case a prompt question isadded for Merge equals ‘True’ instances of the prompt) or a promptinstance. If the collection already contains a suitable instance thenthe existing instance, is returned, and a new instance is not added.

A special functionality is provided for one resolution to combine itsprompt questions with the prompts in another resolution. Thisfunctionality is provided by a “combine” method. It creates new promptquestions in this resolution, based on those in the other resolution.

A resolution object has a method CleanUp that takes no parameters. Thismethod causes the resolution object to clean itself up by deleting allinformation stored in the object involved with executing a specificreport instance. Only the answers given to the prompt questions areretained. This method has several effects. All location information(except the primary location) is deleted. No prompt is marked as Used.No prompt is marked as Closed. The old answer for each prompt is movedto its Previous property. Any prompt whose validation properties referto another prompt is marked as Incomplete, and any value previouslysubstituted into the validation properties is deleted. Other internalstorage used during resolution is freed.

A user may call this method after report execution is complete if theuser wants to save the resolution object used for report execution intothe metadata. However, it is not necessary to clean up a resolutionobject before saving it to the metadata, but failing to do so may resultin a substantial storage overhead, as it saves irrelevant information.Since there are legitimate reasons for a user to want to save aresolution object complete with execution information (e.g. the userwants to schedule the report to execute at a later date) the objectserver permits a user to save a resolution object without cleaning it upfirst.

A functionality is provided to resolve a specific object. Thisfunctionality is also used in report execution, when it is applied tothe report definition object that acts as the starting place of thedefinition of the report. The operation of resolving an object means towalk through the object, and all of its known dependents, and addprompts to a resolution object for all of the prompts that are found.This process is performed by a special component called the resolutionserver.

The resolve method is called to ask the resolution object to resolve anobject. The resolution object invokes the resolution server to scan theargument and its dependents looking for prompts. Prompts which arediscovered are added to the resolution object. The resolution object iscleaned up before new information is added. The Resolve method takes anoptional parameter, CacheOnly, that defaults to ‘False’. Setting thisparameter to ‘True’ ensures that no new objects are to be loaded duringresolution. This functionality is essential if a client wants to use anobject with prompts as a ‘template’ for building other objects.

The resolution action preferably fails if the resolution server detectssome inconsistency in the way that the dependent objects are organized.Situations in which an error may be generated include the following.

1. There is a cycle in the dependency graph. For example, if an object Ais defined in terms of an object B, and object B is defined in terms ofobject A, then the resolution server will refuse to resolve any reportwhich uses either object. Where possible, editors will reject objectsthat contain dependency cycles, but since a single transaction is notused to save all objects involved in a report, it is possible to createthis situation by editing A and B simultaneously.

2. There is a cycle in the import/export relationships. It is an errorif two mutually dependent objects both export and import the same promptto each other. It is required that import/export is used to allow a‘parent’ object to take control of a prompt from its ‘child.’ If theimport/export relationships contain a cycle it cannot be determinedwhich object is the parent and which is the child.

3. There is a cycle in the ‘incomplete’ dependence between prompts. Itis not acceptable for prompts P and Q to both use the other prompt asone of its validation properties. If such a configuration were permittedthen both prompts would be marked as Incomplete and a user would beunable to close either prompt.

4. There is a merging inconsistency involving prompts as validationproperties for other prompts. Suppose that the answer of one (inner)prompt is used inside another (outer) prompt, either as a validationproperty, or as a blank prompt in a draft prompt. By using multipleinstances and import/export it is possible for a user to contrive asituation in which the inner prompt specified to be asked twice, andthat the outer prompt is asked only once. This presents a problembecause the outer prompt is to be asked once, but it is to be askedusing two different values of the inner prompt.

5. The situation described in the previous paragraph for non-draftprompts may also be forbidden when only a single instance of the outerprompt appears, even though the definition does not explicitly say thatthe outer prompt is asked only once. This situation may be forbiddenbecause it would be highly confusing for a user, who would be asked thesame prompt twice with the same title and meaning. The fact that the twoprompt instances do in fact differ (by the validation requirementsapplied to the answer) would not be apparent to the user.

The default behavior when a user asks to resolve an object is to cleanup the resolution object before starting the resolution. However, thereare many situations in which an object cannot be completely resolvedwith a single execution of the resolution server. For example, if one ofthe prompts in the resolution object is incomplete, the resolutionserver should be invoked a second time to make it substitute in theanswer to the inner prompts. Also, if the answer to one of the promptsrefers to an object that did not previously appear as a dependent, thenew object and its dependents should be scanned for further prompts. Andif a user closes an object valued prompt, the resolution server shouldbe used to determine if any other prompts are exported from the newlyclosed prompt.

An optional parameter Repeat is provided that defaults to ‘False.’ Auser should set this parameter to ‘True’ if the user wants to keepexisting information in the resolution object.

Details about the various types of prompt will now be discussed. Foreach type of prompt a description is provided about how to read andwrite the values assigned to the prompt. An explanation is also givenabout what validation properties are available for each type of prompt.

The type of a prompt is indicated by the PromptType enumeration. Forevery type of prompt, an answer for the prompt is represented using asingle VARIANT property. When the prompts' answer cannot be expressed asa simple value, the property returns a suitable collection object thatcan be used to contain the answer. Since a prompt question has up tothree answers associated with it, there are three properties availableto hold an answer.

First, the default answer for the prompt is held in the propertyDefault. Second, the answer for a particular prompt instance is held inthe Answer property. Third, the previous answer for a prompt question isreturned in the Previous property.

There are several properties available to validate the answer of aprompt. The meaning, if any, of one of these properties depends on thetype of the prompt. For some types of prompts these properties areunused. These validation properties are normally assigned at the promptobject level, and they normally cannot be overridden by a promptinstance. First, there is the property minimum (VARIANT), which ispreferably the same type as Maximum (or Empty), and may be specifiedsuch that it is never bigger than Maximum. Second, there is the propertyMaximum (VARIANT), which is preferably the same type as Minimum (orEmpty), and is never smaller than Minimum. Third, there is an entityrestriction (VARIANT) that puts a restriction on the available answers.It is typically a filter, a search object or an expression type. Lastly,there is an object origin (VARIANT), that acts as a starting point forfinding objects that satisfy the prompt. It is, typically an attributeor a filter.

A simple prompt is a prompt whose answer corresponds to a simpledatatype. Simple prompts are defined for the most common Variant types.

A Boolean prompt is a prompt whose answer has the type Boolean. It hasno validation properties, since for the Boolean type eliminating apossible value is tantamount to specifying which value is returned. Thatis, there is no point is defining a prompt whose answer is ‘True’ or‘False’, but for which False is not a valid answer—since this means thatthe user is not being given a choice at all.

Thus, to define a Boolean prompt one declares that the prompt isBoolean. The title and meaning of the prompt is defined, since these arethe properties that distinguish between different Boolean prompts.

A Long prompt is a prompt whose answer has type Long. A prompt'sdesigner can use the minimum and maximum properties to specify minimumand maximum values for a valid answer. These properties should either beset to empty (signifying no minimum/maximum) or to a long value. Minimumshould be smaller than or equal to the answer property, which in turnmust be smaller than or equal to maximum.

A string prompt is a prompt whose answer is a string value. The defaultis to accept any string as a valid response. Integer values are assignedto Minimum or Maximum to specify a valid range for the length of thestring. There is no upper limit on the length of the string.

A Double prompt is a prompt whose answer has type Double. A prompt'sdesigner can use the Minimum and Maximum properties to specify Minimumand Maximum values for a valid answer. These properties should either beset to Empty (signifying no minimum/maximum) or to a numeric value.Minimum should be smaller than or equal to Answer, which in turn shouldbe smaller than or equal to Maximum.

A Date prompt is a prompt used to specify a date. This should be doneusing the VB Date type, but the final decision will depend on how it isdetermined to represent date values.

A complex prompt is a prompt that cannot be expressed as a single value,but nevertheless is a fundamental COM object in the COM API. Most usesof prompts in the COM API are complex prompts.

A DSS Object prompt is a prompt whose result takes the form of a set ofDSS Objects drawn from the metadata. The Minimum and Maximum propertiesare used with integer values to specify an acceptable range for thenumber of objects in the answer. In particular a designer would set bothof these properties to 1 to define a prompt for a single DSS Object.

Specifying how many objects are acceptable does not provide sufficientinformation to validate an object prompt. It should also be known whichobjects are acceptable. Rather than defining a new set of properties forthe various ways of limiting an object choice, the existing concept of asearch object is reused.

A search object is an object that is used to specify a search. It doesthis by containing a list of restrictions on objects (by type, by name,by description, by parent folder, by owner, by content, etc.). An objectprompt uses a search object to validate its answer. Objects that wouldhave been returned by the search are acceptable. A GUI might choose toexecute the search, and then invite the user to choose from the results.A search object is passed to the prompt by setting its Restrictionproperty.

A search object is a DSS Object in its own right, so it is savedseparately into the metadata. A user can always embed the search objectin the prompt object (or in the same container as the prompt object ifthe prompt object is itself embedded) if the user wishes to conceal theuse of a separate object.

In order to use an object prompt it must be understood how to read andwrite an answer for the prompt. The VARIANT returned by all three valueproperties of an object prompt (Default, Answer, Previous) may either beempty (if no value has been specified) or may contain an objectreference (i.e. an IDispatch pointer) to a folder object.

The folder object (which will act like a search folder) may containwhichever objects the user or designer selected. In particular thisallows a client to distinguish between the absence of the value (Variantwill be empty), and the assigned value “no objects selected” (Variantwill be an empty folder).

A user can assign a value to the prompt. There are two basic ways to dothis. One way is to assign something to the property as a whole. This isuseful if the user has access to a single object that describes theselection. However, if the user wants to select multiple objects, thenthe user should use the AddCopy method of the folder returned by theproperty to add additional objects to the property. Of course the usercan only amend the value if they obtained the prompt interface in acontext which allows write access to it.

An elements prompt is a prompt whose answer takes the form of a set ofelements. An elements prompt is very similar to an objects prompt in thesense that the answer takes the form of a collection. There are alsosimilar issues—how to validate which elements may be put in thecollection, how to read the contents of the collection, how to modifythe collection.

As with the objects prompt, the Minimum and Maximum properties may beused to specify a range of acceptable sizes for an element collection. Auser sets these properties to empty if the user doesn't care to set arestriction.

If the designer does nothing else then the prompt will accept any set ofelements. Generally speaking, a designer preferably wants to limit theset of available elements in some way.

The simplest way to do this is to assign a value to the Origin property.This value is interpreted as describing the place from which theelements are drawn. Either an Attribute (meaning that the elements aredrawn from the given attribute) or a Dimension (meaning that theelements are drawn from an attribute in the dimension) may be used. Adimension object contains all the browse path information needed toallow the user to chose elements from the dimension.

In addition to containing relationships between their attributes,dimensions also contain filtering information. So a designer couldcreate a dimension that specifies that only a subset of its elements arepresented to a user. The dimension object also has provision to storemultiple filters, and even filter templates (user types in first threeletters of element etc.) to allow sophisticated control of elementbrowsing.

This functionality permits a designer to specify a prompt that consistsof selecting elements from an attribute using a particular filter—thedesigner could do this by creating a dimension that contains just thechosen attribute. However, to prevent the designer from having to createsingleton dimensions in this way a designer is permitted to set theRestriction property to a filter object when the Origin property is anattribute. This means that the prompt only contains elements from theattribute that satisfy the filter. Since a filter can be defined usingan explicit list of elements, this allows a designer to specify exactlywhich elements are available for the prompt. However, using a dimensionis the only way that a designer can modify the default browse formscollection in the attribute.

The configuration of a dimension in the origin property and an attributein the restriction property may also be used. This means that onlyelements from the given attribute are acceptable, but the user should beasked to use the given dimension to select the elements. The user canbrowse through other attributes in the dimension to reach the requestedattribute, but cannot select elements from these attributes.

Accessing one of the value properties (Default, Answer or Previous) forthe prompt object always returns either empty (if the value property hasnot been assigned) or an element collection (containing whicheverelements were selected). This is done even if the collection containsonly zero or a single element. This enables a user to distinguishbetween an unassigned value and a value that has been assigned to theempty collection without requiring a user to handle too many cases whenexamining one of these values.

A user may desire to be able to assign a new value to an elementsprompt. As with the objects prompt the user can do this either byassigning a complete value to the property, or by retrieving an elementcollection from the property and then using the normal collectionmethods to modify the collection. The complete assignment can be toempty (to unset the property), to nothing (to make the property into anempty collection to a single element to make the collection contain justthis element) or to an existing collection of elements (the entirecollection is copied into the prompt instance).

An expression prompt is a prompt whose answer takes the form of a COMAPI expression. Expressions may be used to define both filters andmetrics. A prompt for an expression is also useful to define conceptslike a metric qualification.

Using an expression prompt represents a situation in which the user isallowed to build any expression that they like. The only restrictionsthat may be imposed on the user are a simple depth requirement, and arestriction on the type of expression allowed. A standard expressioneditor could be used to prompt a user to answer an expression prompt.

For an expression prompt the Minimum and Maximum properties are used torecord a range for the depth of a valid expression. These allow adesigner to specify “how big” the expression is allowed to be. The depthof an expression is the number of IDSSOperator nodes encountered on thelongest path from the root of the expression to a leaf. Thus anexpression has depth zero if it consists of a single leaf node, depth 1if it contains a single operator (as in an Abell metric qualification“metric<32”), depth 2 if it contains an operator nested within anoperator (e.g. “metric<metric2+1”) and so on. An empty expression may besaid to have a depth of −1.

An expression prompt uses the restriction property to record which typeof expression it represents. Assign this property with a value takenfrom ExpressionType enumeration. This enumeration, which remains to bedefined, contains entries like DssExpressionFilter orDssExpressionMetricQualification and so on. Each parameter correspondsto a different type of expression that the parser is able to recognizeand validate.

A value property (Default, Answer or Previous) either returns empty ifthe value is unset, or returns the IDSSExpression interface (if theprompt is assigned). As usual this allows the user to distinguishbetween the absence of a value, and the value which represents an emptyexpression.

Users assign an expression value to a property in the usual way. Theywould assign ‘Empty’ to it to unset the property, ‘Nothing’ to set it tothe empty expression, and an existing expression to replace the entireexpression. Generally a user will edit the expression directly, byreading an IDSSExpression interface from the value property, and thenediting the expression object in the same manner as is used to constructmetrics or any other expression based object.

A draft prompt is a type of prompt which presents itself to a client asa collection of other prompts. The prompts in a draft prompt arereferred to as blank prompts or simply blanks. A blank prompt is usuallyone of the simple or complex prompts outlined above, but it can alsoitself be a draft prompt. A blank prompt does not carry enough contextinformation to uniquely identify it to the user. When a user isanswering blank prompts the user needs to know both which blank prompthe is answering, and which instance of the draft prompt question itcomes from.

A draft prompt is more complex to use and understand than other types ofprompts. Notwithstanding, there are at least two benefits of using draftprompts. First, draft prompts allow a designer to connect togetherseveral prompt objects into a single larger prompt. The user is promptedfor all of these connected prompt objects as a single prompt. The usercan answer the blank prompts as individual prompts, or answer the draftprompt as a single operation, in which case all the blank prompts arealso answered. Second, draft prompts permit a designer to presentprompts to the user with more context information than just thecollection of prompt locations.

The collection of blank prompts in a draft prompt may be presented intwo ways. One way is as an ordered collection of prompt questions.Another way is in the form of a (read-only) DSS Object, or fragment of aDSS Object, called the draft prompt's origin that contains the blankprompts. The answer of a draft prompt consists of the origin with theanswers to all of the blank prompts filled in.

If there are two or more non-merged instances of a draft prompt, thenthere may be two identical instances of the blank prompts that itcontains. The resolution object may distinguish between these instancessolely by which draft prompt instance they are below—there is no wherefor the designer of the report to place a separate Title and Meaningproperty for these blanks, since they both were generated from the sameprompt instance. This is not a problem however, since a clientapplication presents them to the user as part of the draft prompt andnot as separate prompt instances.

Draft prompts are just a class of prompt types. When defining a draftprompt the Origin property is used to define the prompt's draft. Thedraft prompt appears to be an instance of whatever type of object, orobject fragment the draft prompt represents. The designer shouldpopulate this object in the usual way, using normal interfaces, andprompt instances.

When populating the Origin object, the design should use other promptsto indicate blanks in the draft. There is no point in designing a draftprompt whose Origin object does not contain any other prompts, sincethis would mean that there is nothing left for the user to fill in. Theblank prompts may appear in the draft prompt's instance collection.

When the resolution object populates its answer property, it may copyover the fixed structure from the origin property. For example, if theorigin property contains an expression node, then the same node will beduplicated in the answer property. When the origin contains a promptinstance, the answer may instead contain a prompt question. The Promptscollection of the draft prompt's question acts as a shortcut to all ofthese prompt questions. These questions are the blank prompts thatdefine the draft prompt.

Both the Merge property and the import/export mechanism can be used tospecify that a blank prompt is the same as an ordinary prompt that isavailable directly from the resolution collection. If this happens theresolution object may only make one prompt question, but the questioncan be accessed either directly from the resolution object, or from theprompt question that represents the draft prompt.

However if a blank prompt has the merge property set to ‘False’, and noother prompt is imported to replace it, then it will not appear directlyin the resolution collection. This is the behavior that sets the draftprompt apart from other types of prompt. The resolution object willcreate special prompt question for the blank prompt, which is onlyaccessible from the draft prompt's question.

The user can close the draft prompt by closing each blank prompt in thedraft prompt. The user either walks through the structures in the answerproperty, or goes to the prompts collection to obtain a list of blankprompts. Once the user has a blank prompt the user can close it usingany one of the normal techniques. The answer to each blank prompt mustsatisfy the validation restrictions of that blank prompt.

A draft prompt is preferably closed when the blank prompts in the draftprompt are closed. Normally a user answers a draft prompt by separatelyclosing all of the blank prompts in the draft prompt. As soon as theuser closes the last blank prompt, the closed property of the draftprompt will set to ‘True.’

However, a user can also close a draft prompt using a single operation.When the user does this, the resolution object will automatically closeall of the blank prompts. FIG. 12 describes how the resolution objectdoes this. If the user cancels the draft prompt, as in 1202, blankprompts associated with that draft prompt are canceled as shown in 1204.However, if the draft prompt cannot be cancelled, an error is returnedin 1206. If the user sets the draft prompt to default as in 1208, eachblank prompt which is open is closed and set to its default value in1210. If the blank prompt has no default value, it is canceled. If itcannot be canceled in this situation, an error it returned at 1212. Ifthe user sets the draft prompt to preview as in 1214, each open blankprompt is closed and set to its previous value (1216). If the draftprompt has no previous value, then this user action in declined.However, if the blank prompt's reuse property prohibits the blank promptfrom being declined, an error is returned at 1218. If the user declinesto answer the draft prompt, as in 1220, the system determines an actionfor the draft prompt at 1222. The actions could be as previouslydescribed, i.e. previous, default, cancel or break. An error will occurat 1224 if the draft prompt's Reuse property states it cannot bedeclined, or if one of the blank prompts cannot be answered in theprescribed manner.

It is possible for a blank prompt to be incomplete if it requires someother prompt to be closed in order to define the validation restrictionsof the blank prompt. However, it is not possible for a draft prompt tobe incomplete, if it doesn't have any validation restrictions of itsown.

A draft prompt does not have a default value, or a previous value of itsown. Instead it uses the values for each of its blank prompts. Thismeans that both the Default and Previous properties of a draft promptare set to ‘Empty’ on prompt objects and prompt instances. On a promptquestion they should return structures showing what would happen if theuser were to select the Default or Previous value. In particular, thecases “P.Answer=P.Default”, “P.Answer=P.Previous” and “P.Answer=Empty”should be distinguishable.

FIG. 13 illustrates an example of what happens when draft prompts areresolved. It shows the definitions of five objects—a filter 1302 calledF, and four prompt objects, which consist of two draft prompts, 1304 and1306, also called E and MQ, a metric prompt 1308 called M and a doubleprompt 1308 called V. Filter object 1302, and prompt objects 1304 and1306, each shows its definition and prompt instances 1326, 1328 and 1330respectively.

The resolution object is shown that would be generated if the filterwere resolved. Each oval 1312, 1314, 1316, 1318, 1320, 1322, 1324 and1330 below the resolution object represents one of the eight promptsthat will be given to the user in order to answer all the prompts in thefilter.

A normal prompt like M (1332) and D (1316, 1320, 1324) may preferablynot contain any other prompts, but the draft prompts may contain otherprompts. It is possible for one draft prompt to be nested inside anotherdraft prompt. In FIG. 13, the instance of the E 1312 prompt contains aninstance of MQ, which in turn contains an instance of M 1332 and aninstance of D 1316. To simplify the diagram the expression trees havenot been drawn in the resolution object, but in fact each draft promptexposes its children via an expression tree as well as via a collection.

Normally a prompt question's primary location is sufficient to identifyto which prompt question being referenced. For example, MQ is askedthree times (1314, 1318 and 1322), once for each usage of MQ in thedefinitions. However when a prompt is below a draft prompt the primarylocation may not suffice. In this example, the D prompt is asked threetimes (1316, 1312, 1324), each time with the same primary location. Theonly way to distinguish between each occurrence is to see which draftprompt contains it. Since the M 1332 prompt's Merge property is ‘True’,this prompt is only asked once. The prompt question can be accesseddirectly from the main collection in the resolution object, and alsofrom each instance of MQ.

An expression draft prompt is a draft prompt whose answer is anexpression. It can be used to prompt for an entire expression, or toprompt for a sub-expression of a larger expression. It differs from theusual expression prompt because the designer of an expression draftprompt must provide an Origin expression. This expression containsprompts to indicate blanks that we want the user to fill in when thedraft prompt is executed.

The expression draft prompt should be used to define something like asimple metric qualification prompt. The designer of the prompt canspecify the format of the expression. The GUI can then recognize whetheror not it is appropriate to use a special metric qualification dialog toask the user to answer the prompt. The GUI should attach a specialDSSProperty to a prompt to indicate whether or not it meets therequirements of such a dialog.

Origin may be the only validation property used for an expression draftprompt. As explained above, this property is used to define the draft ofa valid answer. A designer inserts prompts in the Origin to indicateblanks in the draft. During report execution the user may be required tosupply an answer for each blank prompt. Unless Merge is set to ‘True’for a blank prompt, or the import/export mechanism is used, the blankprompt is preferably required to be answered once for each question thatappears in the resolution object based on the draft prompt.

An example is provided here. A metric qualification prompt is defined.This prompt is based on three other prompts: “SelectBaseMetric”,“ChooseOp” and “ChoosePositive.”

SelectBaseMetric prompts the user to select a metric from a folder ofmetrics. We want to do this once during report execution, and use thesame metric in the template, and in the metric qualification. ChooseOpselects a single operator object. ChoosePositive selects afloating-point number, that must be larger than zero. These prompts aredesired to be treated simply as ‘blanks’ in the definition of the metricqualification. If the metric qualification appears twice then theyshould be asked twice.

The three value properties (Default, Answer and Previous) of a questionnode based on an expression draft all return either ‘Empty’ or anIDSSExpression object. In the first case it indicates that the value isnot set. In the second case the interface is the root of the expression.The expression can be examined in exactly the same way as it is examinedfor an expression prompt. The expression cannot be edited—its purpose isto show the user the relationship between the blank nodes in theexpression.

If a user wants to answer an expression draft prompt, the user shouldanswer the single question based on the SelectBaseMetric prompt. Theresolution object preferably makes one question, and return it frommultiple places.

The user also should close the ChooseOp and ChoosePositive questions.These questions may preferably be found under questions based on thedraft prompt. The user can either extract them from the Answer propertyof the draft prompt or use the Prompts collection on the draft prompt.If the draft prompt appears several times in the resolution object, thenthe blank questions should be answered separately for each appearance ofthe draft prompt.

FIG. 14 is an embodiment of the available prompt types according to thepresent invention, and the acceptable data types for each type of promptfor the various validation properties.

As disclosed above, it is possible to place a prompt object withinanother prompt object. Details of how export and import worked when oneprompt was used inside another prompt have been provided. Now, furtherdetails on how one prompt can make use of another prompt are provided.

There is nothing particularly special about using one prompt insideanother prompt. The procedure is the same as when a prompt is used inany other application object. The object that wants to use the promptexposes a property (called Prompt if it only takes one prompt likeIDSSConstant, or called something like XXXXPrompt if it is the promptfor the property XXXX). The object that wants to use the prompt assignsthe prompt to the prompt-valued property.

The prompt-valued properties of a prompt are defined at the promptobject level. The import/export mechanism can be used to modify how theprompts inside a prompt are resolved.

When a prompt appears inside another prompt, it forces the inner promptto be answered before the outer prompt. The value of the inner prompt isthen used to validate the outer prompt when it is answered. Two prompts,however, should preferably not be mutually embedded in each other.Prompts defined in this way fail validation. If a user executes a reportcontaining mutually recursive prompts, then report execution may causefailure.

It is also possible for one prompt to use another one indirectly. Thishappens if a DSS object assigned to one of the prompt's propertiescontains prompts itself. For example, a user could place a prompt in thefilter assigned to the Restriction property of an elements prompt. Theprompts are evaluated in order; otherwise the correct list of elementscannot be generated for the user to use to select the outer prompt.

The mechanism of incomplete prompts described above is used to enforcethis dependency of one prompt on another. It allows the resolutionobject to refuse to close the outer prompt until the inner prompt hasbeen closed.

There are four prompt-valued properties in a prompt object, whichcorrespond to the four validation properties of a prompt. These allow auser to define a prompt whose value depends on another prompt that hasto be answered first. A user is not allowed to supply a prompt for theanswer value of a prompt—since numerous mechanisms have already beendefined by which a user can specify that two prompts have the sameanswer. The prompt-valued properties include MinimumPrompt,MaximumPrompt, RestrictionPrompt, and OriginPrompt. With these, a promptcould be defined as that it's validation depends on another prompt.

For example, a designer may want to make a prompt that asks the user toselect a single Store from the Stores in a filter chosen by anotherprompt. The only way to do this is to make the new prompt dependent onthe old one. This illustrates why the locking mechanism isessential—there is no way to determine if an element is valid until theuser has chosen the filter.

A designer can achieve much more complex relationships between promptsby permitting one prompt to indirectly refer to another prompt. Theconcepts however are the same.

FIGS. 15, 16, and 17 show the relationships between the COM API objectsused to manipulate prompts. Three different object maps are shown inFIGS. 15, 16 and 17 for the three different ways in which prompts areused. In each case only the properties are shown that are relevant tothe particular case.

FIG. 15 shows the properties on the prompt interface that are used whendefining prompt objects. Information on the prompt is maintained at1504, and its default kept at 1506. The prompt's Minimum and MaximumRestriction and Origin are at 1508, 1510, 1512 and 1514 respectively.Similarly, Minimum Prompt, Maximum Prompt, Restriction Prompt and OriginPrompt are kept at 1516, 1518, 1520 and 1522, and Minimum Imports,Maximum Imports, Restriction Imports and Original Imports are at 1524,1526, 1528 and 1530. The prompt interface also has other properties, butthey are not used to define prompt objects.

FIG. 16 shows the ways in which a prompt instance can be used on anobject 1602. FIG. 16 only shows those properties on the prompt interfacethat can be assigned when the prompt is used as a prompt instance. Thereare three ways in which a prompt instance may be used. There could be anexplicit reference to the prompt instance as illustrated by 1616. Theprompt instance could be exported to another application object thatappears in the definition as shown in 1618, 1620, 1622, or 1624. Or, theprompt could be exported to some other prompt as shown in 1604, 1606,1608, 1610, 1612, and 1614.

FIG. 17 shows the properties of the IDSSPrompt interface at 1704-1720that are used when it is accessed from the resolution interface. In thiscase there are properties to show the current and former value of theprompt. There is also a collection of locations 1712 where the promptwas used.

Other embodiments and uses of the invention will be apparent to thoseskilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practiceof the invention disclosed herein. The specification and examples shouldbe considered exemplary only.

1. A prompt object on a computer-readable medium used in creating areport to be executed in a reporting system, wherein the report mayspecify a prompt object as a property of the report, the prompt objectcomprising: a question to be asked of a user; a prompt type; and atleast one validation property; wherein the prompt object is used increating a report to be executed in a reporting system, wherein thereport may specify a prompt object as a property of the report, andwherein the prompt object is an object separate from the report suchthat the prompt object may be used more than once in a single report ormay be used in more than one report.
 2. The prompt object of claim 1wherein at least one validation property comprises verification that theanswer provided to the question is of the specified prompt type.
 3. Theprompt object of claim 1 further comprising a default answer to thequestion.
 4. The prompt object of claim 1 further comprising a meaningthat, upon request by a responder to the prompt, provides an explanationof the question.
 5. The prompt object of claim 1 further comprising areuse value that indicates whether an answer provided from a previousinstance of that prompt object, a default value or a new value is to beused for an answer to the question in the prompt object.
 6. Acomputer-implemented method of creating a report to be executed on areporting system the method comprising the steps of: selecting atemplate with one or more template properties; selecting a filter withone or more filter properties; and specifying one or more of thetemplate or filter properties with a prompt object; wherein the promptobject comprises: a question to be asked of a user; a prompt type; andat least one validation property, wherein the prompt object is an objectseparate from the report and separate from the one or more templates orfilters such that the prompt object may be used more than once in asingle report or may be used in more than one report.
 7. The method ofclaim 6 wherein at least one validation property comprises verificationthat the answer provided to the question is of the specified prompttype.
 8. The method of claim 6 wherein the prompt object furthercomprises a default answer to the question.
 9. The method of claim 6wherein the prompt object further comprises a meaning that, upon requestby a responder to the prompt, provides an explanation of the question.10. The method of claim 6 wherein the prompt object further comprises areuse value that indicates whether an answer provided from a previousinstance of that prompt object, a default value or a new value is to beused for an answer to the question in the prompt object.
 11. The methodof claim 6 further comprising the step of specifying a single promptobject for a plurality of properties in the report and wherein uponreport execution, the question receives only one answer that is providedto a each property properties for which the prompt object was specified.12. The method of claim 6 further comprising specifying at most oneprompt object for a template or filter property.
 13. The method of claim6 wherein the template comprises a set of templates properties and thefilter comprises a set of filter properties and wherein every templateand filter property may be specified as a prompt object.
 14. Aprocessor-readable medium comprising code for execution by a processorto create a report to be executed on a reporting system, the mediumcomprising: code for causing a processor to enable a user to select atemplate with one or more template properties; code for causing aprocessor to enable a user to select a filter with one or more filterproperties; and code for causing a processor to enable a user to specifyone or more of the template or filter properties with a prompt object;wherein the prompt object comprises: a question to be asked of a user; aprompt type; and at least one validation property, wherein the promptobject is an object separate from the report such that the prompt objectmay be used more than once in a single report or may be used in morethan one report.
 15. The medium of claim 14 wherein at least onevalidation property comprises verification that the answer provided tothe question is of the specified prompt type.
 16. The medium of claim 14wherein the prompt object further comprises a default answer to thequestion.
 17. The medium of claim 14 wherein the prompt object furthercomprises a meaning that, upon request by a responder to the prompt,provides an explanation of the question.
 18. The medium of claim 14wherein the prompt object further comprises a reuse value that indicateswhether an answer provided from a previous instance of that promptobject, a default value or a new value is to be used for an answer tothe question in the prompt object.
 19. The medium of claim 14 furthercomprising code for enabling a user to specify a single prompt objectfor a plurality of properties in a report definition object and whereinupon report execution, the question receives only one answer that isprovided to a each property properties for which the prompt object wasspecified.
 20. The medium of claim 14 wherein the template comprises aset of templates properties and the filter comprises a set of filterproperties and further comprising code for causing a processor to enablea user to specify a prompt object fear each template and filter propertyselected.
 21. A system for a report to be executed on a reporting systemcomprising of: report selection means embodied on a computer-readablemedium that enables a report creator to define one or more of atemplate, filter, or properties thereof with a prompt object; whereinthe prompt object comprises: a question to be asked of a user; a prompttype; and at least one validation property, wherein the prompt object isan object separate from the report such that the prompt object may beused more than once in a single report or may be used in more than onereport.
 22. The system of claim 21 wherein at least one validationproperty comprises verification that the answer provided to the questionis of the specified prompt type.
 23. The system of claim 21 wherein theprompt object further comprises a default answer to the question. 24.The system of claim 21 wherein the prompt object further comprises ameaning that, upon request by a responder to the prompt, provides anexplanation of the question.
 25. The system of claim 21 wherein theprompt object further comprises a reuse value that indicates whether ananswer provided from a previous instance of that prompt object, adefault value or a new value is to be used for an answer to the questionin the prompt object.
 26. The system of claim 21 wherein the reportselection means enables a report creator to specify a single promptobject for a plurality of properties in the report and wherein uponreport execution, the question receives only one answer that is providedto a each property properties for which the prompt object was specified.27. The system of claim 21 wherein the report selection means enables areport creator to specify at most one prompt object for a template orfilter property.
 28. The system of claim 21 wherein the templatecomprises a set of templates properties and the filter comprises a setof filter properties and wherein every template and filter property maybe specified as a prompt object.